Developing an FAQ with Google Q&A
When Google launched Q&A, it was an overwhelming outlet for businesses to manage and a great tool for customers looking for answers about a business.
The major downfall and benefit of Google Q&A is that anyone can ask a question, and anyone can answer. For businesses, brand representation comes into question, and they’re challenged with not only answering questions themselves, but also monitoring the responses left by others on the web.
Despite the challenges, when managed at scale, Q&A is an excellent forum to bring customers and businesses together and improve engagement with your brand.
The FAQ’s Potential Impact
A relatively unexpected benefit of Google Q&A is the real estate space in the SERPs to highlight a business’s FAQ. The Q&A at first appears to be a reactive space for the business to respond to customer concerns, but the FAQ shows that it can be a proactive branding opportunity as well.
The FAQ allows businesses to educate the customer by filling prime SERP real estate with informative, brand-positive content.
No other time of the year is more fitting for this space than during the holiday season. This is especially true in the year of Covid-19.
There are so many questions businesses could anticipate and answer in advance this holiday season. Are you carrying a certain product? Are you staying open later for holiday shopping? How are you handling returns? What are your Covid-19 precautions?
What to Include in Your FAQ
To figure out your questions, look to a variety of forums:
- Connect with your customer service team. What are the popular questions being asked across your site or in your stores? Pull from those, and showcase them on your listings.
- Audit your existing Q&A. Look for trends and common themes among your questions.
- Monitor your Search Console Traffic. If there are popular queries that relate to common questions, these can be applicable in the FAQ.
- Look at your GMB reviews. There may be popular topics that your customers could benefit from you discussing in a FAQ space.
How to Manage at Scale
For enterprise businesses, managing Q&A and posting an FAQ at scale can be an intimidating thought. Large businesses should look to partner with a listings management company to help manage their Q&A via an API. Investing in a partnership like this can allow your business to manage all questions in an easy-to-use dashboard.
When exploring where this should fall internally, it’s common for businesses to rely on their customer service teams. Customer service usually has the verbiage and brand voice that most companies prefer when interacting with customers. Another common team that this can fall under would be a digital marketing or SEO team. These teams are very familiar with Google tools and management, so it’s an easy fit for them to take ownership.
Google Q&A when utilized by businesses during the holidays and beyond can help your business to connect with customers on a broader scale. The visibility of your listings can broaden your reach for popular topics that your customers care about. Generating this engagement with your listings can lead to higher rates of participation with other elements of your listings, thus creating overall success.
Kaci Cramer is a Strategic Account Manager at Brandify.
